Deb - I've always said that in my home, MEN are from Venus and WOMEN are from Mars. I say this because some of the cliches about man-woman communication are switched in my house. A big one is the cliche that a woman complains about something and just wants her partner to validate her feelings, while the man wants to jump in with solutions and analysis to "fix" it. In my house, the roles are reversed - and it sounds like, in this interaction, your roles are too.
I never used to understand why my H would get more upset when I started to analyze something he was complaining about - or worse yet, accuse me of not supporting him if I pointed out, ever so gently, that there might be two sides to a particular story. Now I understand he really just wants me to validate his feelings. There might come a better opportunity to talk about the specifics, but it is NOT when he is venting.
